This is how we should think about building modern careers

Introducing 'The Career Web'.

The sun had fallen below the horizon and was casting a brilliant burnt orange across the sweeping sky and glistening ocean in front of me. It was 6pm last Sunday evening at the very remote beachside Airbnb that my boyfriend and I had decided to book for a much-needed long weekend, after what’s been a hectic few months for us both.

As the sea breeze swept over my face, I heard the deliciously soft pop of a cork from the kitchen.

“Would you like a glass of wine while you write?”, the loml called out through the open door to the patio where I was sitting, fingers poised over the keyboard while noodling on what to write about this week.

“Abso-fuckin-lutely!”, I shouted back as I melted into the chair where I’d remain well into the night.

Tap tap tap. I typed, deleted, paused, pondered.

I started thinking about where I’ve been, where I am, where I’m going. About my future, our future, society’s future, the future of work.

I thought about the collective sense of unease we all feel about corporate systems, political structures and the supernova-esque AI-powered change happening all around us, and our slow realisation that a full-time job might not be the most stable and secure path anymore.

I thought about the boom of the freelancer and creator economies and how massive segments of the workforce are opting out of traditional employment structures to do their own thing.

I thought about how people en masse are being suffocated by the mandate to pick one career lane and stick to it, and that they’re taking risks in search of more meaning, more alignment, more creativity, and yes, more money.

I couldn’t help but wonder…

The way we work is no longer working. Or was it ever?

Introducing The Career Web

We all know (and love/hate) the traditional way of thinking about career - the corporate ladder - and we also know that this no longer holds true in the world of modern work. We’ve since been introduced to the concept of a squiggly career popularised by the best-selling book of the same name, which talks about “a non-linear career trajectory where individuals frequently change roles, industries or career directions based on their evolving interests, skills and circumstances”.

The squiggly career is a brilliant concept but what if we went one step further? What if we thought about our journey not as dancing along one squiggly line, but as pursuing many lines at once? What if we thought about career building as a web?

The Career Web - my working framework for modern careers - says that your work life can be built by you, for you, with you at its centre. It’s my thesis that your career is made up of skills, capabilities, experiences and connections that intersect and overlap to create a structure that’s uniquely yours. In this model you’re in control. The builder. The creator. The maker.

A career web has several defining characteristics:

• The radial strands: These represent your core skills, capabilities, knowledge and income streams and act as the base structure for everything else.

• The connections: Your relationships, audience, community, personal brand, reputation, taste, judgement and creative thinking that tie everything else together.

• A surface area: The more you spin, the more you weave, the more expansive your web becomes and the more opportunities will fly by and stick.

• It’s always changing: The web is in a constant state of flux. Not static, not tangled, but elastic.

• It’s always growing: As you shift, change and expand, so does your web. You build a new radial strand. You make new connections. New opportunities emerge.

Spin, weave, engineer, build

We’re entering a new era of work where leverage, opportunity and potential is no longer reserved for founders willing to take big risks or corporate execs who’ve sacrificed everything to get to the top. Anyone with the appetite to learn, the courage to show up and the belief to continue can construct a life outside the norm.

We’re still early in the portfolio career slash chuck-out-the-career-rules adoption curve, but what if (when) we hit the late majority? What if there’s a fundamental reimagining of how we work, why we work and what we work on?

What if our identity and bank balance were no longer tied to a job title or company but to our own grit, strength, courage and contribution?

What if success was less about status and power and more about resonance? A sense of fulfilment knowing that our work reflects all of who we are, not just part of what we can produce?

What if our careers were spun, woven, engineered and built like a spider’s web?

What if - as individuals, as communities, as societies, as a culture - we could restructure the world to make this possible for many? I hope this is within reach, but it will take time. It will take commitment. It will take reorganisation. It will mean challenging everything we know to be true.

Will it be easy?

No.

Will it be worth it?

Abso-fuckin-lutely.

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🎙️ A deep dive into the career web metaphor and how you can start spinning one of your own:

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🫶🏼 When you’re ready, here are three ways I can help:

• Free Training: Stabilise, Systemise and Scale Your Portfolio Career: learn the inbound and outbound acquisition strategies to generate a consistent flow of leads and grow your income, and the workflows to that will help you increase capacity beyond your time.

• The Portfolio Career Operating System: a fully fledged system for people who do multiple things and want to do them well. I’m talking Sales, Marketing, Content, Product, Clients, Ops, Finances and Admin.

• Portfolio Career Mentoring: 1-1 sessions to help you get started and build a career that sits at the intersection of freedom, creative fulfilment, meaning and money.

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